Category: Empowering Discussions

Empowering Discussions

What does it mean to be female in our world?

Impower You

It means you have the power to give life. Sure it takes a man and a woman to create life, but women are the people who are accountable for bringing a child into our world. You are a giver of life and you have the power to teach your children that they are beautiful loved and equal in your eyes. Women are more likely to stay at home and nurture a child and spend more time with them than the father. This is an inconvenient truth (Though there is no reason for men to not spend time nurturing a child after they have left the womb. In fact we need more men to nurture their children).

It means you can be raped by a man and told that it is your fault. Or maybe you are told that that person couldn’t control themselves. Well that is just not true. Rapists are not poor troubled boys or disturbed men. Rapists are people who want to control and inflict pain on another person. So it also means that you can fight back. You are NOT a victim. You deserve to be treated with respect and you have a right to say NO!

It means you are strong! You are equal to a man. You are not less, you are not better. You are equal. Perhaps your family, your religion and your culture tell you that you are less and nothing more than an object, but that is just not true. You are capable of being amazing! You can change the world or change your community. You can be a scientist, a writer, a director, a CEO, a mother. You can be whatever you want to be. Always listen to mind and never listen to a world that says you are less than equal.

It means you are beautiful. Your eyes, your hair, the color of your skin, your weight, your height. These make you beautiful and unique. You are beautiful without makeup, with frizzy hair, with freckles, with a few extra pounds or a lack of curves. You are most beautiful when you laugh and when you smile. Don’t believe the hype that you need to look plastic perfect. YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL!

More here: mpwru.webs.com

What does being a female in our world mean to you?

Empowering Discussions

Respect and Confidence Go Hand in Hand

Impower You

I originally wrote this for my empowerment website. You can see that here: http://mpwru.webs.com

Respect for yourself is necessary for a fulfilling life. Self respect cannot be bought or forced, but it is within your grasp. What exactly does it mean when people say “Believe in yourself”? Obviously you are a real living person and you don’t need to believe that you exist. What we should say is Believe in your ability to accomplish your goals. Trust your instincts, listen to that voice in your head that says maybe what I want IS possible. It may be far out of reach at this moment, but it won’t always be so far from actually happening. Confidence is not much different than self respect. You basically need one to have the other. If you are confident in your abilities than you will respect yourself. On the other hand if you don’t have any faith in your abilities than you probably feel more loser than superstar.

This shouldn’t be news to you, but doing something amazing takes skills, hard work and patience. Miracles, angels, luck, karma, coincidence; they all happen occasionally to help us achieve our goals, but we cannot rely only that to get us where we want to go. Ask any successful person about their life and they will tell you of struggles, failures, days, weeks, months or years when everything went wrong. Still they persevered, believed in their ability to accomplish what they wanted and did not listen to the voice in their head that says they could not do it.

Accomplishing a goal that is important to you will give you a great dose of self respect. When you respect yourself it is easier to respect others, because you can see the greatness we all possess and know first hand that what you once thought of as lofty dreams can become your reality.

There is probably a greet deal that you have already accomplished. If you can speak, read, walk and feed yourself than you have achieved what we call basic skills. However there is nothing basic about these skills. You did not learn to walk in a day, you crawled around for about a year and learned from trying until you could stand up and put one foot in front of the other. Apply this same principle to all of your goals and respect the process you must go though before you can achieve anything.

Empowering Discussions

Quit Stereotyping Me!

Impower You

Once again women are under attack for being smart and more of American youth are getting messages that education is stupid. The issue today is clothing with sexist messages used to sell clothing. Could these messages be partly to blame for our nation falling behind the education of other countries? Absolutely.When you hear a message over and over again it becomes part of your life and will form your opinions whether good or bad!

Want to do something? You can sign this petition or at the very least use it to start a conversation. The only real positive change comes from people deciding not to put up with negativity anywhere.
http://www.change.org/petitions/tell-forever-21-stop-selling-clothing-with-sexist-messages

I would be just as outraged over a guys shirt that said “Sensitive is Stupid” or “Real Men Hate Pink”. There is no reason to perpetuate gender stereotypes that make people feel bad because they like something that is mainstream!

What was the last sexist message you absorbed and how did it affect you?

Empowering Discussions

Sink or Swim

Impower You

“No wonder your heart feels it’s flying, your head feels it’s spinning, each happy endings a brand new beginning, let yourself be enchanted, you just might break through to ever ever after” This song, Ever Ever After from a movie titled “Enchanted” is stuck in my head. Even though I feel the saying “happily ever after” is silly, I love this part of the song.

I don’t want a fairy tale romance, a prince or a castle. I do want to feel enchanted by life and find the magic I believed in as a child. I miss those days when I believed anything was possible and that there really were magical beings, supernatural forces and adventure in every forest, dark attic or foreign land.

I want to feel alive. I crave adventure and a mission that will take me far away from all that I know and submerse me in a new story.

Someday will never come if I continue to play it safe though. Starting today and for the rest of the year my goal is to jump out of my safe zone and see what happens. I would rather sink in a wild ocean filled with my true passion than swim in a calm stream filled with doldrums of a boring life.

Empowering Discussions

Want some good business karma and create a positive difference in the lives of others?

Impower You

You can do this when you become a sponsor for the 2011 Business Essay Contest. This is a great opportunity to get your business noticed in front of thousands of entrepreneurs and to support small business in the USA. This essay contest is for women business owners in the USA over age 18. Women who are just starting a business and non profits are also encouraged to apply.

Sponsorship starts at only $29 a year. Where else can you get such a great deal for advertising and helping other business owners achieve their dreams? The goal is to raise $500 for each grant. Sponsors also receive monthly shout outs on the Investing In Women Facebook page, www.facebook.com/InvestingInWomen that will be seen by over 400 fans! Your individual sponsorship is very important. The full amount for each grant MUST be raised no later than October 31st, in order to award the grant and send out a press release by November 15th.

This is the third year of cash awards given out through Investing In Women, but they cannot do it without your help. Visit the sponsor page to learn more and if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask. www.iiwomen.webs.com

Karma’s calling, come and get some!

Empowering Discussions

Oh Molly!

Impower You

Oh Molly. We will miss you. All of us who have a sense of humor and who don’t want to live a life pushing our values onto others.
Your writings were hilarious. You made me laugh. I only lived in Texas for a year, but your articles really caught my attention.
Thanks for being so ornery!

Read some of Molly’s funny anecdotes on the atrocious governor rick perry and his HAIR.
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/08/rick-perry-molly-ivins

Learn even more here about my hero: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molly_Ivins

Empowering Discussions

That is not me

Impower You

Your actions toward me are ugly, but I am not.

The words you throw at me are stupid, but I am not.

You are mean, but not because of me. I did not make you that way. Someone else taught you to be horrible.

I was taught to be kind and to love. After so much time in your company I have become careless and pushed love away.

I cannot stay with you. I will not stay with you. I don’t want to become like you.

I cannot change you and make you be nice to me or to anyone else. If you want to be nice you can. If you want your actions to be substantial than make an effort. If you want to share smart words than that is your decision.

I am substantial, I am smart. I can love. I choose to be this way.

I am not asking you to leave. I am kicking you out of my life.

Empowering Discussions

What does lonely feel like?

Impower You

It feels empty and cold. It is the burning sensation that starts in your chest and consumes your whole body. feel like nothing. Like a giant hole that will never be filled.
Lonliness is sad, it is terrifying, it is polarizing. It feeds on my pain. It feels like forever. After a while it feels normal. I want to fill it with love, with anything. no matter how temporary, no matter how fleeting. I fill my emptiness with hatred, with loss, with a numbness that makes being alone seem more inevitable each year.

Empowering Discussions

I shocked myself today

Impower You

Today I rode my bike uphill for a mile and a half without stopping. I didn’t start out with that goal in mind. In fact I was sure that there was no way I could actually accomplish such a feat. I told myself just ride to the the top of the first hill and then you can walk. When I got to my destination a little voice inside said, why not go a little further. There was another hill and I wasn’t planning on going up all the way on my bike there either. Yet I did, then another and another and another until I had climbed five hills!!!

My legs and lungs burned with all this new exertion. However as I went up that last hill I felt newly energized and excited to make the whole trip without a pause. I was so surprised that I had biked the whole way without giving up.

This is fairly new for me. I tend to give up rather quickly and say that I don’t need to do this or that. It’s not important, even if it really is. So I shocked myself today by riding my bike all that way without stopping to rest. It was an amazing feeling. Perhaps this is the start of something new, perhaps I am growing stronger. I sure hope so.

Empowering Discussions

This is the Sound

Impower You

This is the sound of waves crashing, sun shining, laughter, delightful squeals, my feet in the sand, the rush of catching a wave, the heat, the breeze, the cool drinks, my family, my friends, strangers all having a good time.

The memories of beaches past fill me with joy. Smiling and wishing this here and now could last forever. Knowing we will have to go home soon, but not worrying at all. I am in the moment and no dark memories, no pain, no sadness can creep in here. The only darkness here is the umbrellas shadow, the cool relieving shade that caresses my overheated body.

This is the sound of me happy.